


Five Times Living in Avengers Tower Sucked (And One Time it Sucked a Little Less)

by andacus



Series: What Happens in Bangkok Totally Doesn't Stay in Bangkok. [3]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Humor, Sorry Not Sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-26
Updated: 2014-02-26
Packaged: 2018-01-13 20:37:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1239979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andacus/pseuds/andacus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are a lot of things Darcy never thought she'd say. ("I swear to god, if they go at it like that again tonight, I'm turning the hose on them!")  There are a lot of things Darcy never thought she'd care about ever again.  ("You can't send me to my room!  I'm already in my room!  Also... I'm an adult!")  There are a lot of things no one should ever say or care about.  ("Is that mold breathing?")  Somehow, way too many of them are relevant to her life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Times Living in Avengers Tower Sucked (And One Time it Sucked a Little Less)

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I'm sorry I'm not sorry. This is entirely meant to be fun and silly and give you a laugh, so I hope that it accomplishes that. If you've not read the other stories in this series, it might be good to do that, as this makes little sense without having read Living Someone Else's Life, though you don't need to read The Price of Privacy to understand this one.

I

 

"I swear to god this place is like it’s own ecosystem! No, I take that back, that's too flattering. This place is like a Petri dish."

Darcy stares at the sink, scowling at the pile of overflowing, filth covered, stinky dishes that are clogging up the giant it’s-so-big-because-Tony-Stark-cannot-have-normal-sized-things sink, and groans. It’s getting ridiculous, really. No one does anything even remotely resembling household upkeep and if Darcy gets stuck doing the cleaning one more time, she might have a nervous breakdown. 

It’s time for action.

It takes several hours and a trip to two separate shopping malls, but when she’s done, Darcy thinks she might just have to start practicing her evil mastermind laugh.

The next day, she is prodded awake by Clint, who has an amused and excited look on his face. “I would tell you that you have got to come see this, but I think you already know all about it.”

“I’m sure I have no idea what you mean,” she says, unconvincingly.

They trudge to the kitchen, Darcy a little grumpy at being awake at oh-six-hundred and Clint just lousy with glee. When they arrive, it is to something nearing chaos. And really? They stare in the face of certain death on a regular basis, but one little inconvenience in the house and they’re devolving into anarchy?

“What the hell is this?” Tony says while she drags the coffee carafe toward her and debates drinking straight from it. He’s holding up a plastic plate with Iron Man’s face on it and she really shouldn’t need to explain this.

“That’s a plastic plate with Iron Man’s faceplate on it. It’s a plate face.” Darcy chuckles at her own joke, but Tony just glares.

Bruce, who is sitting at the breakfast table reading something on his tablet, says nothing, but Darcy’s pretty sure she hears him snort.

“Where are the normal dishes? And the normal cups?” Tony asks, digging through cupboards and drawers.

“Must I use the one with my own likeness?” Thor asks. “Or may I use one with the likeness of another?”

“And the cutlery,” Steve adds from inside the pantry. “Can’t find the baking sheets or casserole dishes either.”

“This plate is so tiny,” Thor laments. “I require a larger dish than this.”

“Has anyone seen the water glasses?”

“Who moved the cooking utensils?”

“Am I meant to use this for all meals?”

“The tumblers had better still be in the bar, because we do not drink alcohol out of plastic in this house.”

Natasha is watching from the corner, a plastic Black Widow cup in hand, her face blank. 

“How am I supposed to make muffins?” Steve asks, looking crestfallen.

“Yes, Darcy,” Natasha says, tone flat. “How is Steve supposed to make muffins?”

“Steve may check out a muffin tin from the bakeware inventory, after which he will wash, dry and return said muffin tin. You’ll probably want check out a bowl, measuring cups and some spoons, too.”

They all turn to look at her, Tony with an expression of gobsmacked horror. “Where are all of the dishes?!”

She stands her ground and ignores the way Clint crosses to sit next to Natasha, muffling his laughter. She says, “No one here does any dishes or any cleaning of any kind and since there is not a single maid with high enough security clearance in the existence of the world, I am always the one to end up doing it. And I’ve put my foot down.”

Tony, Thor and Steve glare at her, while Clint laughs louder and Bruce just leaves the room, a rueful smile on his face.

“You will each use the set of dinnerware that has your own image on it. For example, Steve uses the Captain America plate, bowl, cup, coffee mug and cutlery. Anything else is available by request and due back the next day. Sort of like the library. Plus, if anyone leaves their stuff in the sink, we know who did it.”

Tony opens his mouth to argue, a smug look on his face, but Darcy cuts him off.

“And if you just use someone else’s stuff and don’t wash it, they get to retaliate however they see fit. So, yes Thor, you may hit Tony with Mew-mew if he tries to frame you.”

Steve pulls a white plastic plate from the shelf and holds it up. It has a long red chili on it and Steve’s expression clearly asks what the hell that means.

“That’s Pepper’s,” Darcy says, not sorry at all. “When you are all responsible enough to clean up after yourselves, you may have everything back.”

It takes three weeks, the threat of leaked photos of them eating off of their own merchandise, and a call to Fury, but finally, they get a maid in the form of a S.H.I.E.L.D janitor. Tony hates it and promises terrible punishment on Darcy if the maid feeds Fury information, but the dishes get done and the carpet gets vacuumed and the bathroom stops smelling, so Darcy decides she doesn’t so much care about whatever paranoid scenario he’s cooked up.

 

II

 

Surprisingly enough, despite evidence to the contrary, it isn’t living with her father that is the problem - it’s living where she works. 

In theory, living a few floors away from work seems like a great idea. There are a million upsides: There’s an itty-bitty commute, which means less travel time, which means more sleep, which also means easy trips home for nooners on her lunch break; there’s the money saved by not having to take public transit or drive (not that money is an issue anymore, but whatever); at the end of the day, it takes, like, two minutes to get home and into her pajamas; when an idea strikes her in the middle of the night (a thing that she is apparently genetically predisposed to), Darcy can run off to the lab and start working on it right away; it doesn’t matter if she forgot her lunch or her keys or that stuff she took home to work on, because she’s technically still at home; and when disaster strikes, she’s right there anyway, ready to fix whatever’s broken or needs replacing.

The downsides, however, might make all of those things irrelevant.

Darcy’s just dragged the afghan over her and pressed play on the remote when there’s a banging on her door. She looks at the clock. It’s nearly ten at night and she knows it isn’t Clint, because he’s in his own apartment, passed out, right where she left him. Also, he doesn’t knock.

“JARVIS,” Darcy says, pausing her movie. “Who is that and can you get rid of them?”

_Knock knock knock._

“I’m afraid not, Ms. Lewis. Sir is insisting you let him in.”

“What does he want?”

There is a pause and after a moment, JARVIS sighs. “It appears he has had a ‘brilliant idea again’ and would like your help.”

“He doesn’t need my help.”

 _Knock knock knock._

“He is being rather insistent,” JARVIS says, sounding like maybe he’d like to toss Tony out of the window, which is pretty much the same feeling Darcy has.

“Tell him I’m busy having sex.”

“No you’re not!” Tony yells through the door. “And that’s disgusting and we can no longer speak of these things. That is now an off-limits topic!”

Frustrated, Darcy gets up and yanks the door open. “What?”

Tony grins and then scowls. “Are those Hawkeye pajamas?” When Darcy just crosses her arms, he continues. “Come on, I’ve had the greatest idea for repulsor boots for Natasha.”

“No.”

He falters and makes several uncomprehending faces. “No?”

“No, Tony. It’s nearly ten, I worked all day - you should know, you were there - and I have to get up and work again tomorrow. I want to sit on my couch and watch a movie and not think about work. At all.”

“But why not? We can bring the movie, if you want. And the couch.”

She stares at him and his excited-I’ve-just-genius’d-the-hell-out-of-something face and she comes to a terrible conclusion. She can’t say no. Not because she doesn’t want to, but because he’d be so disappointed if she did. And against her better judgement, she loves the little demon.

“Okay,” Darcy says, defeated. “But I’m coming home before three and I am taking tomorrow off. And I really mean off - no dragging me to the lab for a full 24 hours.”

“Deal! But change your clothes first.”

 

III

 

Avengers Tower is basically a college dorm.

Unlike her dorms, however, Avengers Tower is incredibly sturdy, luxurious, convenient and, well, very cool. JARVIS alone makes the place worth living in. But despite all of this, despite the state of the art engineering, the superior construction, the we’re-totally-living-in-the-future tech, nothing (seriously, not one thing) can compete with the God of Thunder’s sex life.

“Can we put them on some kind of schedule?” Clint asks. “At least then we know when to expect it.”

“Yes,” Tony adds from his spot on the couch. “Like children and napping. We’ll just put them in their room for an hour at the same time every day.”

“I’m fond of just spraying them with water like cats.” Natasha is curled in a little ball, her face all agitated lines. “And if I don’t get some sleep soon, I may not be responsible for my actions.”

Steve walks in, his face stoic and surprisingly un-blushing. He sits in one of the recliners and nods a greeting to bruce who is in the other.

“Well, we’re all here. Again. At the asscrack of dawn.” Tony sighs exaggeratedly. “What will it be this time?”

They all groan and mumble and someone says Die Hard, but someone else says Terminator and they finally decide on the newest Bond. which they have all seen, but it doesn’t really matter because the objective is not to watch a movie so much as it is to drown out Thor and Jane’s very active, very loud sex.

At some point, Darcy nods off against Clint’s chest, and when she wakes up, it’s to an entire room full of sleeping superheroes and one giant alien god standing in the doorway.

“Did I forget movie night?” Thor asks, looking disappointed. “I love movie night.”

“Oh, buddy,” Darcy says in the same tone she used to use on her dog when she felt bad for punishing him, and wonders just where exactly she should start explaining.

 

IV 

 

Okay, she takes it back, living with her father sucks. Even if their relationship is about as unconventional as one can be.

Or maybe _because_ it’s as unconventional as it can be.

Tony is not the most traditional parent. Given that he didn’t know he was a parent for so long, that’s hardly surprising, but he gets very parental in the most unexpected ways.

“I swear to god, Barton, if you make me a grandfather I will cut off your balls and roast them over the repulsors,” Tony says and Darcy groans, pretending she can’t hear their conversation from the neighboring room.

“Tony!” Clint exclaims, all mock excitement. “I know you’ve heard this before, but you’re a genius! Hey Darce, what do you think about babies?”

Darcy has to muffle her laugh in one of the pillows. The way Steve is looking at her all wide eyed is doing nothing to quell her laughter. “I love babies!” She yells after a moment. “That’s exactly what this place is missing! Lets make babies, Clint!”

“Neither of you are funny at all,” Tony says and stomps through the room and into the elevator.

Now, this seems like a pretty funny situation and not at all worthy of the sucking category and that’s because it totally is. It’s the fallout that sucks.

When Darcy and Clint sit down on her couch to watch TV later that night, they find that every channel plays nothing but various live birth videos. Some are documentaries, some are educational videos, some are terrifyingly none of the above (where the hell did he get those?) and all of them are disgusting. Darcy tries to convince JARVIS to return her TV to normal, but he only feigns ignorance.

“You’re the worst big brother ever,” she tells him and isn’t even sorry when he says, “That hurts.”

The next day, the scarring programming is gone from her television, but instead, there are three messages on Clint’s voicemail trying to confirm his vasectomy appointment for later that day.

The day after that (and this is the one that finally breaks her), they endure several calls from her mother, panicked and screaming, because she’s been told Darcy is trying to get pregnant. And that... that is just too far over the line. That is an act of war.

 

They don’t intend to make a sex tape. The idea is entirely to fake a sex tape.

It mostly goes to plan. Except for the part where they actually make a sex tape. 

“JARVIS!”

“Miss Lewis, is yelling really necessary?”

“I thought we were clear on this. You were supposed to record only two minutes! You know, a little making out, a little inappropriate use of the car’s hood! Two minutes!”

There is a huff and when JARVIS replies it is with considerably too much sass. “Then I expect you probably should not have manually entered the parameters.”

Darcy opens her mouth to reply, pauses, and says instead, “Explain.”

“You typed a twenty in the command rather than a two,” JARVIS points out. “I understand that you were circumventing your father’s security protocols, but that also overrides any voice commands you gave me.”

Frustrated, she stomps her foot in a manner that’s far too petulant and far too much like that person whose DNA she is forced to share and who she is decidedly not thinking about at the moment.

“Delete it.”

Another sigh from JARVIS. “I can’t do that, Miss Lewis. You do not have clearance to erase security footage.”

“Fuck!”

Maybe if she ignores it, it will go away. What are the odds that anyone is interested in the security footage of the garage from a random Monday? Why would anyone want to watch the corner where the Jag sits at three am _any_ day of the week? It’s fine, she tells herself. No one will ever see it.

Two days later, Tony barges into the lab, his face a sickly green color, making Darcy’s stomach flip and twist with dread and anticipation of terrible things. He looks at her, immediately looks away, shivers, looks back at her, and holds up an authoritative finger. “Truce. You win.” 

Without another word, he flees the room, barking orders at JARVIS about the benefits of inventing actual brain bleach.

 

V

 

Clint and Darcy break up on a Friday. It’s a shitty Friday. He says he isn’t apologizing for whatever stupid thing he did and she says she doesn’t care at all and they yell and stomp and by the end of it, he’s taken all of the assorted clothes and toiletries that he’s got stashed around her apartment and Storm-Trooped out the door.

Determined not to cry or wallow or feel even remotely sad about it, because he’s so wrong and she’s so not, Darcy packs a bag, calls a taxi, and flies to California. Pilar, who really should hate her for falling off the face of the earth after college, is waiting for her at the airport, all sympathy and girl-advice. She even brings ice cream. To the airport. Pilar is the best.

They’re curled on Pilar’s couch, watching some documentary about bears when it hits. 

“Oh, god,” Darcy says, suddenly anxious and uncertain, tears threatening. “What am I going to do? This is such a mess. My life is such a mess. 

“No, honey, it’s not,” PIlar says kindly.

Darcy gives her an incredulous look. “In the last three years I’ve discovered alien life, helped save the world, joined a covert government organization, discovered Tony Stark is my father, and been dumped by a superhero. Holy shit!”

Pilar doesn’t answer, doesn’t appear to have an answer. Instead, she hangs an arm around Darcy’s shoulders and sighs.

“How the hell is this my life?”

“Well, at least it isn’t boring. And I think _you_ dumped _him_.”

“Debatable.”

They sit in silence for a long time, the narrator on the TV explains the nutritional needs of pregnant black bears, and the sun slowly slides down the horizon. The heavy silence is broken suddenly when Darcy’s phone (which had been turned off, because obviously) blares AC/DC from the depths of her purse. With a sigh, she flicks the power off again and tosses it onto the coffee table.

Pilar says nothing, keeping her attention on the TV.

The phone is silent for about ten seconds and then starts wailing once more. It stops and starts again. Stops and starts yet again, but this time with vibrations thrown in. Manically, the vibrations begin to speed up, increasing in intensity and frequency until it is not only shrieking, but buzzing frantically, too.

“How the hell does he do that?” Darcy grumbles, grabbing the phone and swiping the call open. “I’m not in the mood,” she says in lieu of a greeting. 

Tony’s face fills up her screen and he looks decidedly unhappy. “Where the hell are you?” He shouts and Darcy can hear several people in the background suddenly stop talking.

“You know, your facial hair is doing that thing again where it makes me want to take you even less seriously than normal.”

“You’re hilarious. And completely grounded.”

“What do you want, Tony?”

He rolls his eyes. “Oh, you know, world peace, clean energy, TO KNOW THAT YOU’RE SAFE AND NOT KIDNAPPED BY CRAZY PEOPLE!”

Oh shit. She didn’t even think about that. Probably former kidnap victims should not disappear unannounced.

“Oh, god, I’m sorry,” she says and sincerely means it, because she didn’t intend to scare anyone, she just needed to not be in that damned tower. She needed to get the hell away from Clint and from work and from her life. She knew they would have all heard the fight, knew everyone would already know that she and Clint had split up. Facing them all had just seemed too hard and too embarrassing.

Tony, scowl firmly in place, appears to have nothing further to say, because he turns away and his face is replaced by a confused looking Steve.

“Uh, hey,” Steve says.

“I’m sorry,” Darcy repeats.

“I know. It’s… well, not okay, because you scared the tar out of everyone, but we know you’re safe now. In the future though, leave a note, maybe?” 

“Yeah, I will. That was thoughtless of me and I’m sorry.”

“Oh,” Steve says, his face falling into something that looks apologetic, which is worrisome and makes Darcy cringe before he’s even continued speaking. “We, uh, may have panicked, as you can tell, and you might be getting a security detail any -”

He’s cut off by the crash of thunder and the sky lights up outside the window.

“Minute.”

Darcy looks at Steve, wide-eyed and indignant. “You sent Thor?!”

“Hey,” Tony says, taking the phone back. “If you were kidnapped - again - you would be very grateful that we sent Thor!”

Darcy spares a glance at Pilar. Her friend is staring at the phone in Darcy’s hand, her face an odd chalky color.

“I’m sorry, Pilar, but this is going to get even weirder in a minute.”

There’s another rumble of thunder and the apartment door bursts open in a shower of splintered wood and drywall.

“Oh my god!” Darcy jumps up and makes a run for the entry way, hoping to stop Thor from doing any more damage or mistaking Pilar for a hostile and electrocuting her, but when she gets there it isn’t Thor who charges into the room.

“Darcy?”

She crosses her arms, her phone clutched in one hand. “What are you doing here?” Her voice is harsh and angry and she isn’t even sure why anymore.

“What am I doing here? What are _you_ doing here? In case you didn’t notice, you’re in _California!_

“You say that like you give a shit.”

Clint’s face goes hard, the muscle in his jaw tightening in that way that is absolutely not the sexiest thing ever. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“You know exactly what that means.”

“Is there some reason I’m not supposed to give a shit? Am I supposed to suddenly give fewer shits because we had a fight?”

She doesn’t exactly know how to answer that. She isn’t really thinking with her head and she admits to herself in a small, ashamed voice, that she might be acting unreasonably. She doesn’t admit this out loud of course and is saved from having to reply by the appearance of a giant, blonde, thunder god in the doorway.

“Clint, I have just heard from the others,” Thor says, oblivious to what’s going on between them. “Darcy is… oh, there you are.”

“Hey, Thor.”

“I am relieved that you are well. And I am sorry about the doorway.”

Pilar squeaks in reply, her whole body rigid. 

“I am Thor of Asgard,” he says, crossing the room in about two steps, and holding a hand out. “Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Pilar manages to lift a hand and hold on while Thor enthusiastically shakes her entire arm, his smile wide and friendly. 

“Any friend of Darcy’s is a friend of ours.”

“Except that Tino guy,” Tony shouts from the phone in Darcy’s hand. “That guy’s a weasle.”

“Tony,” she says, glaring at the phone.

“Seriously, he’s got this creepy habit of -”

“Tony!”

“With fruit. Who does that? Not that I’m judging, because -”

“TONY!”

“WHAT?”

“Get Pilar’s door fixed, put her up in a hotel for the night… actually, where’s Pepper?”

“Right here,” Pepper says from somewhere behind Tony. “I’ll take care of it.”

“Thank you.”

“Hey,” Tony says before she can disconnect.

“Yeah?” She’s trying very hard not to sound annoyed, but she’s failing.

“I… uh… I… you know.”

She can’t help smile just a little. “Yeah, I know.”

Tony looks relieved at not having to elaborate on his emotions and clicks the phone off quickly. Darcy, her mood slightly lifted, turns to the people in the room who are not Clint Barton. Thor is grinning.

“Your father loves you very much,” he says, apparently the only man in her life who speaks of emotions without shame or unease.

“Pilar, I’m so sorry. This is why I have no life outside of my house.”

Pilar, rather suddenly, perks up and a grin splits her face. “What are you talking about? This is awesome!”

Clint snorts and Darcy shoots him a glare. He holds his palms up in surrender and looks away from her.

They get back together the following Thursday after Darcy finally admits she was being unreasonable and Clint finally apologizes and, somehow, overheard make-up sex is a million times less embarrassing than overheard breaking up. Go figure.

 

VI

 

Admittedly, there are a few perks to her living situation. 

She gets the flu and it’s the very worst ever. There is snot and phlegm and vomit and she wishes she would just slip into a coma and sleep through it. She asks Bruce if that’s a thing he can do, telling him at length about how nice and useful comas are, but he smiles and politely refuses.

“It’s rude of him not to helb me,” she tells Pepper from her blanket cocoon. The couch has become her sickbed for no reason other than that was where she stopped when she tried to actually go to work. Two days later, she’s still there. There are boxes of tissues, bottles of NyQuil, Mucinex, Tylenol and assorted cough drops, an overfull waste basket, about nine blankets, and Dummy, who was placed at her side in Tony’s stead. He apparently has an aversion to sick people.

Dummy whirls over, a tray clutched in his claw. She says thank you and takes the glass of water he’s offered.

“Okay,” Pepper says, “I will be in a meeting from ten to noon. If you need anything, please call.”

“Pebber, it’s fine. What could I need that I can’t get fromb one of the many cabable peoble here?”

“Aside from sanity?” Pepper asks.

Darcy laughs and then coughs and then whines. She really hates being sick.

“Alright, I will bring soup for dinner,” Pepper says, making her way to the elevator.

Natasha comes by around lunchtime (same as yesterday) with crackers and ginger ale, but says very little, which is fine by Darcy since her head is pounding and her throat hurts. Clint shows up in the mid afternoon and drags a blanket over them both, which is nice and warm and she drifts off to sleep. When she wakes up, someone has moved her to her own bed and there’s a hand drawn card (her own sleeping face) that has Steve’s tight scrawl inside, wishing her well again. 

She feels like shit, that’s definitely true, but she wouldn’t want to feel like shit anywhere else.


End file.
